Reports of my demise have been greatly exaggerated.
True to form these days, the supposed 1-hour procedure wound up taking most of the day.
That's all right - beat the rap anyways.
A couple highlights, fresh off my still somewhat-foggy noggin now that we're home:
- I was told to be there at 7am for pre-op, which we were...which then turned into 8, then 9, then 10am...
finally, someone came and fetched me and back we went, where the requisite open-back gown was
donned and inflatable this and grippy that was installed, along with the IV (which I had to help them
with as usual - poor things don't get much practice on those in school apparently).
Then...
11am passes....then 12pm....and by now, I'm getting pissed.
Not eating since 2am and in desperate need of a smoke will do that to a fella, so appropriate hell was
raised.
Success! Surgeon magically appeared shortly thereafter and things got going...
Special guest star was the anethesiologist, a 6'-0 tall, friendly enough fella named - wait for it - "Melanie".
Not kidding.
No questions were asked - it dawned on the wife later what that was all about.
I specifically told him/her/flying squirrel to take it easy with the knockout drugs, based on past experience.
That apparently was not heeded, as you'll see soon...
Off they wheeled me to the OR....which by the way, I have no recollection of, even though at that point
I had received nothing in the way of drugs. Wife says I was chatty on the way, too.
The time by that point was around 1pm, a full 6 hours after our arrival.
Surgery, wife the source of info here, took about an hour. No worries, all went well apparently.
No, all the fun came after they started trying to awaken me from the knockout drugs...
The first thing I recall at this point was groggily starting to caveman my way back to some sense of
consciousness.
In the recovery room of that medium-sized towns' hospital, there were a total of (7) attendants.
Gender count was (6) females, various sizes - and Melanie, of course.
Know how I know that?
They all,
every dang one of them, were ON ME - trying to hold me down as I came to.
They had ahold of arms, legs, feet, shoulders - and I was the center of attention, trying to get up,
reportedly cussing up a storm and fighting back with all I had.
I specifically remember the poor little blond who vainly tried to work my left arm alone; poor thing
got tossed, I'm now embarrassed to admit.
All I could think of was "why are all these people trying to hold me down?" followed by "y'all better
have packed a lunch, we gonna be here a while".
Various and sundry spicy cuss words tossed in there, of course - when I see red, I get all ghetto in
my language as part of getting worked up.
After a couple minutes solid of that, I finally had worked my way loose of all upper body "opponents"
and they had regrouped into a last-ditch effort to gang up on legs, admitting at least partial "defeat".
Cro-magnon Ed accepted that victory and chilled a little, for whatever reason - as long as I could
GET UP, I was good - and as my fog continued to lift, ever more peacefully now, apologies were
issued, many laughs were shared and they admitted I had been the first to ever "defeat" all of
them in that room at once, for what that was worth.
They also admitted that, just perhaps, a little too much anesthesia might have been administered.
Gee, ya think?
Once I was wheeled back into my room to my wife, the look on her face told the tale.
A look of relief? Naw.
One of love? Ya, right...
No, it was quite obvious she had been briefed on the behind-the-curtain action, so I got
that look....
which I took great delight in, naturally.
Once I was allowed to dress properly again and demonstrate some restroom skills had returned, they
wheeled my happy *** out to the car and down the road we went.
Total time spent on a one-hour "day surgery"?
Pretty much the whole damn day - but they'll all have fresh stories to tell.
I guarantee it.
P.S. For those keeping score at home, the mesh insert measures 3" x 6" I'm told.
I got a prescription for Oxy's....HELL NO. Nope. Not interested. No painkillers, as usual.
